I'm Not Okay
by The Daxinator
Summary: SoraxRiku After the thrill of the life or death battles wear off, and the guilt and pain finally catch up to them, even the happy go lucky ones find it hard to keep up the facade. But Sora and Riku don't want to give up without a fight.


**I'm Not Okay**

I was thinking one day about how even though Sora tries to make the situation light-hearted and brushes off Riku's arguments, it surely doesn't fix the problem of Riku probably having quite a few "problems" after spending nearly two years in or around the darkness. This is my take on Riku and Sora after the thrill of the life-or-death battles wears off, and the guilt and pain finally catch up to them. They both slowly sink into apathetic depression. Sora though, still ever the good guy, tries to help his friend and keep their minds off of the feelings of self-hatred. But even Sora can't keep up the happy go lucky face all the time.

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"I refuse to do that to Riku! He's my friend and I won't abandon him like that!"

Sora's angry voice from the hallway outside of my room jolts me out of my slumber. It takes a minute for my sleep-muddled mind to fully grasp the meaning of his words, but when I do, my stomach plummets and I feel a strange sickness that makes me have to fight not to gag. I swallow thickly to get rid of the sour taste that wells up in the back of my throat but my effort is wasted when I hear the confirmation of who has come calling.

"I understand that you don't want to think that Riku has a problem, Sora, but that's exactly what it is. Riku has a very real problem and he needs help—professional help. He's killing himself, Sora."

It is said with so much obviously fake sympathy that I just want to run out there and punch the bastard in the face. But my anger is quelled by a thrill of fear and hurt when I don't immediately hear Sora protest his statement. Surely Sora isn't really considering...

"Dr. Lawsaki," Sora's voice says with a deadly calm that halts my thoughts, "I want you to leave my house. My answer is final; Riku stays. I will not send him to some mental hospital just because you've made it your life mission to lock him up. Leave."

Sora's voice has an icy finality about it that brings a faint shiver to my body, even though it's not directed towards me. Sometimes I forget the kind of hell that Sora had to go through over the past two years, but in

moments like this, I can see clearly that even if Sora is usually so cheerful, it _did_ affect him.

In all seriousness though, for a minute there, I was scared that Sora was seriously considering the doctor's proposal. I've rarely been so scared of anything in my life.

I berate myself a moment later for thinking so little of Sora. He isn't me, after all. Sora has always been loyal to a fault. I'm the filthy traitor, not him.

My thoughts are shattered by a loud scoff from Dr. Lawsaki and his reply to Sora's declaration.

"I suppose you think you can cure him with your friendship?" the doctor says with a sneer so obvious in his voice that I can see his sneering face in my mind.

"Like so many other fools," he continues, " you think that you don't need the help of medication and doctors to fix him."

Sora doesn't answer him; I imagine that he's staring him down out there. I know that I should probably go to Sora and help him out—it is me that they're arguing over after all—but I'm rooted to the spot by the doctor's next words.

"Or perhaps you believe that your _love_ will make him better," Dr. Lawsaki says with disgust. I can just barely hear it, but Sora gasps lightly and that just fuels the doctors tirade.

"Oh yes!" the doctor exclaims dramatically, "I know all about your relationship with him. People say that they've seen your disgusting displays in the streets."

I sit up, enraged beyond words when I hear him talking about us like that. How dare he come into our lives and try to pass judgment on us! I'll kill him once I get my hands on him!

I'm halfway out of my bed, though the sheets are still tangled around my legs, when the doctor starts up again, this time his voice has a sly undertone to it and it's much quieter. His words are obviously meant for Sora's ears alone, but the doctor doesn't know that my room is only a few feet away from their conversation at the door and I hear every word. They nail me where I sit as effectively as if literal bolts held me down.

"Tell me, Sora, is he in you bed right now, like a good little slut? Is he laying there waiting for you to throw me out so you can get back to fucking hi—"

The crashing of glass and Sora's furious voice cut off his sentence.

"GET OUT!"

More glass shatters and Dr. Lawsaki yelps loudly. The chaos startles me out of my shock and I swing my legs over the side of the bed and I hit the floor running. When I skid out into the hallway, I see Dr. Lawsaki desperately wrench the door open and flee through it. Sora grabs a good sized chunk of broken glass that lays scattered at his feet and he throws it at the terrified man. The missile falls short by a few feet but the explosion of glass on the sidewalk behind him gives the man a burst of speed. He's at his car and driving away as fast as he can within 30 seconds.

Sora stands in the doorway, his shoulders heaving and his fists clenched at his side. Blood has begun to drip onto the now sparkling floor from the one that he grabbed the piece of glass with. His entire body trembles with his pent up anger, and I feel almost afraid to approach him.

I shake my head to dispel that ridiculous notion—Sora would _never_ hurt me—and I mentally brace myself before hesitantly walking towards him.

I try to be as quiet as possible but the effort is ruined when I first step on the minefield of crystal shards that surrounds him and hiss out in pain. He whips around, his eyes _glowing_ with his anger, and I freeze in my tracks. We stare into one another's eyes and after a moment, the tension bleeds from his body and he sighs. I hold back my own sigh of relief and watch him as he runs his unbloodied hand through his hair and then shoves the door closed.

The already small fragments are crushed to powder beneath his black sneakers as he comes to me and the crunching is the only sound around us before he stops barely a few inches from me. He brings his uninjured hand up and holds my cheek in it as he closes his eyes in exhaustion. I search his face for something that even I don't know before leaning into him and wrapping my arms around his neck. The glass in my feet stings as I shift my weight but I ignore it as I try to lend comfort to Sora. I don't know what to do other than just hold onto him but he doesn't seem to mind because after a few long moments he brings his arms around to lay loosely on my waist. I press my cheek to his gently but other than the tiniest pressure back, he doesn't respond.

We stay like that for a while, the minutes ticking by unnoticed except that I can feel Sora slowly getting a hold of himself in the calmness of the early morning. The blood that I had previously heard rushing through the veins in his neck has steadied out considerably and I can barely hear it anymore.

Finally, Sora pulls back and places the most delicate of butterfly kisses at the corner of one of my closed eyes before bending ever-so-slightly to hoist me up into his arms. I follow his direction immediately and wrap my flannel-covered legs around his waist.

He carries me over the glass scattered on the floor and somewhere down the hallway while I just cling to him, uncaring of where he takes me, as long as he stays there with me.

He turns and one of his hands leaves me to flip a light switch. He sets me on a cold, hard surface and I pull back to observe that we're in the bathroom across the hall from our rooms.

The paint is a bright, cheerful yellow that I can remember lazing in the bathtub watching Sora apply it to the walls. He'd said that cheery colors would be better for me to look at when I was upset and since sitting in the empty bath tub was usually my favorite retreat when something was bothering me, we should paint the bathroom something "happy".

The memory brings a slight smile to my lips despite the dark mood that has settled over Sora. He frowns at my smile and I allow it to slide off my face as he kneels and bats my swinging legs out of the way. After a minute of fumbling in the cabinet, he stands, the large blue and green Tupperware that serves as our first-aid kit under one of his arms.

He sets it beside me and then goes to work on his hand, removing all the bits that he can with his bare fingers and then reaching inside the first-aid kit for some tweezers. He meticulously cleans his hand afterwards, running the pads of his fingers over it to make sure that he got all of the glass. Once he has placed some of the tiny band aids on the worst of his cuts, he kneels in front of me and holds out a hand expectantly. I catch on immediately and lift a foot to carefully set it in his grasp.

He works silently for several minutes, the only sound passing between us being Sora occasionally whispering a distracted 'sorry' when I flinch enough for him to know that I'm in pain. I tilt my head back and try to zone out the maddening silence. I've always thought that people who labeled silence as 'deafening' were just poetic lunatics who were trying a little too much to sound "deep", but after living with Sora for the past few weeks, I think I know what they were saying. Sometimes the quiet is just so complete that you want to scream out loud to break it. But at the same time you're scared that your voice won't actually make a sound. So you stay silent, and hope that it's all just in your head.

Heh. I guess that actually sounds a lot like that 'poetic lunatic' crap that I dislike so much. And besides, I'm probably not the best person to be talking about things being "all just in your head". Despite what Sora wants to believe, I'm not taking pills twice a day for nothing.

And that brings us around that nice little circle back to the cause of Dr. Lawsaki's visit. If the good doctor were to be believed, I'm not only 'unwell', as Sora sometimes says, I'm a damn basket case that should be locked up in a padded room and drugged up to my eyeballs in anti-depressants and sedatives so that I can't hurt people around me. While I don't really agree fully with Sora's assessment of my just needing 'someone to be there', I know for fact that I'm not nearly as bad as Dr. Lawsaki would have people—and often **_does_** have people—believe I am.

Depressed, apathetic, self-loathing, whatever, take your pick and that's me. Psychotic, knife-wielding lunatic though? Eh.

To be fair, there was one tiny incident that occurred in his very office that does give his claims some credence. There were no knives flying through the air though. It was a chair—a heavy chair, granted, but just a chair none the less. And I personally hold to the claim that anyone would have done the given the nature of his questions and the ill-concealed revulsion with which he spoke to me. And as if being spoken to like I was some sort of vile piece of trash that he couldn't stand the sight of wasn't bad enough, he even had the nerve to ask me if I was paying rent to Sora—with the use of my body. Seconds seemed to span for hours as I just stared, horrified, into his sneering face. And then, before I knew what I was doing, I was out of my seat and the nearest thing to me was soaring through the air towards his head—the nearest thing being the chair I had just vacated.

So yeah, to be fair, he does have a valid reason to worry about angering me. Now whether or not that he cares for the well-being of others is really the reason he keeps trying to force the issue of St. John's with Sora... well, I'm not convinced. I think he's still a little sore about the seven stitches and me winning the court case due to his own notes about me being mentally unstable. Karma sucks sometimes doesn't it, you old bastard?

I'm brought out of that amusing little thought by Sora standing up before me again.

"Thank you," I say quietly as I attempt to slid off the counter. Sora doesn't reply, but stops me by taking another step forward so that I don't have any room to move. The action startles me slightly and I look at him in surprise. He just stares at me, his eyes locking onto mine and refusing to look away or even blink to the point that a blush starts to burn on my cheeks. What is he thinking?

An almost sad smile cracks over his face and he brings a hand up to brush my hair away from my face.

"You're welcome," he says as his arms slid around my shoulders to hang loosely and his lips contact mine softly. His forehead touches mine and his dark blue eyes swim with emotion as they look into my own, an unfathomable sadness overshadowing them. With another kiss he pulls back and sighs as he runs a hand through his brown spikes.

"Sora?" I whisper in confusion.

He opens his eyes and seems to slump even further.

"I'm sorry, Riku. I let my temper get the better of me and you got hurt as a result. I'm sor—"

I cut him off by placing my fingers to his lips. He looks over at me with some surprise and I smile at him reassuringly.

"It's alright," I say as I push him back a little so I can get off the cold surface. I can't help a tiny wince when my cut up feet hit the floor with the force of the rest of my body behind them, but I try to hide it a little for Sora's sake. When his eyebrows scrunch in concern, I know that I haven't done a good job of masking it. He tries to open his mouth from behind my fingers—undoubtedly to apologize again—but I shake my head and press harder.

"It doesn't really hurt. It just surprised me, is all," I say and allow my fingers to fall. I grab his uninjured hand and gesture with my head towards my door.

"Want to come to bed with me?" I ask him and tug on his hand a little.

"Er...I thought you didn't like...erm...in the morning. Eh...yeah..." he trails off with a little bit of a blush on his cheeks.

I bite my lip to keep from laughing but it doesn't work for long.

"Sora," I laugh breathlessly, "get your mind out of the gutter! I just wanted to snuggle, you dork! It's cold and I want to go back to bed."

I continue laughing at his slightly miffed expression and after a few moments of scowling at me, he starts chuckling himself.

"Right, right. Laugh it up, Riku," he says with a mock-pout that isn't very convincing due to the fact that his mouth keeps stretching in a smile.

"I will," I answer him cockily, "Now do you want to come back to bed with me or not?"

He shakes his head and, gesturing to his sweatpants and t-shirt, says, "No, I was about to go running before the dick-head decided to show up."

I immediately assume a pout that has yet to fail me. He stares for a moment before shaking his head with an amused chuckle.

"Not working this time, babe."

So much for never failing me.

I try my best to look hurt and it apparently works better than my pout because Sora is instantly trying to make amends.

"How about this though, once I get back I'll sweep up my mess, jump in a shower, and then come take a nap with you. That sound alright?" He looks into my eyes inquiringly, awaiting my approval of his plan. My god, I love this man. He's always so self-sacrificing and I can't help but love him for it.

"Yeah," I agree, nodding my head, "But don't worry about the glass. I'll clean it up while you're out."

"Alright then," he nods, "I'll be back in about 45 minutes or so."

He smiles softly at me as he leans in to give me one last burning kiss. I kiss back eagerly and our tongues duel for a moment before I pull back and shove against his chest playfully.

"So get going already!"

"Alright, alright. I can tell when I'm not wanted." He steps back, holding his hands up in defeat and rolling his eyes before his expression softens and he mouths something to me which I return to him with equal silence.

Satisfied, he turns and jogs down the hall and out the door, the sound of crunching glass announcing his footsteps.

I walk to the door so I can watch him as he disappears down the sidewalk. I know that I probably look goofy smiling like a lovesick puppy watching its first crush leaving.

"I'm not okay now, Sora," I say in the empty hall of our empty house, "But for you, I think I can be someday."

As I close the door and go to find a broom, I think back on Sora's silence declaration fondly. I really am in love with that guy.

_I love you, Riku._

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This so did not come out like I originally planned it. But I suppose I'm happy with it...for now. As I do with all of the things I write, I'll probably revise this in a few weeks when I've completely forgotten the storyline and feel the need to refresh my memory. Until then, I welcome any and all reviews that want to point out errors for me. My tenses have the tendency to declare war on each other when I don't write everything in one go—which I almost never do. And, I've been told that I have a strange way of wording my sentences, so if things start sounding a little weird and you're going "WTF???" more often than not, please do tell me.


End file.
